Why are Roe deer so different in their habits ?

Deer stalking
GEORGE WALLACE
Blimey, this one could take us a while! I have no doubt that Mother Nature, in her wisdom, had some master plan but I’m blowed if I can see what it is.

Sensibly, one would have thought, deer would have indulged in their most energy consuming activities (rutting, antler growth and fawn/kid/calf development) when there was a good supply of food to replace the lost energy.

However, they seem to have got that only partly right and our friend the Roe Deer has, as in so many other things, his own way of doing all of them.

I have heard suggestions that the Roe is different because he is a much older, more primitive, species but that is not really so.

Roe and Red Deer evolved around the same time and both have been here in Britain for hundreds of thousands of years.

All I can suggest is that the Roe is different just because he is different.

There doesn’t seem to be any obvious reason for it other than Nature’s well-known idiosyncrasy.

Talk about this in the Shooting UK forums!